Love the iris! Nice to see your daylilies are starting.

Sherry

Love the iris. Emvy being able to see the peony blooms. It is always so good to see the season beginning.

kay

The irises are all so pretty. I just wish they stayed in bloom longer.

Nice early season blooms! So glad the season is starting in earnest for you

Sherry

The daylilies are nice to see but the climbing rose "Polka" is my favorite. Such a pretty color. I understand from friends that it is fragrant too.........Maryl

I'm excited to see those purple seedlings have tall scapes for you this time. I hope you will get some fantastic blooms from those and Bubblegum Queen.

Debra

I have a friend that lives on a river in illinois a few miles from me. She called me and asked us to come and see the swarm on her property. A huge tree growing on the river bank had thousands and thousands of bees in the branches, could hardly see the leaves. The bees stayed for two days, never left the tree till they departed……a spectacular sight.

Sherry

Wow! So interesting Ben! Thanks for sharing….. I did not know bees would not sting while in a swarm. Mother Nature’s always a learning source!

debra

Those are pretty and very different Sherry. Neat!

kay

Sherry: How interesting. I've tried to get a certain type of Epimedium for years and just this year it became available. I've never grown Epimedium before, but they say it will take dry-ish shade once established. Nothing other then Columbine has made it in this spot so far (digging up a failed fern this year) so we will see. I really like yours. The flowers are lovely.............Maryl

You give me hope Sherry...................Maryl

C. Moonstone is a pretty bloom. Gorgeous roses again. Your gardens look really lush now!

Sherry

Kay, so pretty to see your blooms. The landscape pic looks like you wil have a bumper crop of daylily blooms again this year.

Thank you Julia. Yes, there are copious bloom scapes on the plants and the "shaw" should begin shortly.

kay

Gorgeous iris, Brad! Not many left here….glad i can enjoy yours and others members blooms.

Sherry

I like that NOID too. Reminds me of a fuller form of a Dutch Iris.........Maryl

Brad, you summarize my experience with irises also. Very attractive, but a lot of work for a short blooming time. Add to your notes the fact that many, if not most, require division every three years or so. And they are disease prone.

Ooooo, just lovely!

Sherry

That is just lovely! And very unusual. almost resembles an epimedium more than a hosta, in the coloring!

What does it look like when the spring color fades?

A light greenish-yellow like the new leaves that haven't colored -up yet.

Yeah, Fernstone blooms! Keep em coming, Kay!

Sherry

Thank you, Sherry and Maryl. Maryl, it occasionally does rebloom but not a lot. It does usually put up about 15 sscapes though so it is a good bloomer.

kay

Gorgeous Kay. I always look forward to the start of your bloom season. Hope your doing okay and getting some relaxation and truly enjoy your garden.

Julia

Hooray for the start of your daylily season! The iris an cactus flowers are so pretty!

Debra

The blooms are starting! i enjoyed the cactus flowers. Relatives in Arizona send photos occasionally of their saguaro blooming.

Sherry

Scapes! That exciting! I can't wait to see your photos.

Those mowers better get with the program! What a pain to have to worry about that. I mowed off a couple seedlings this spring too, but they look fine now.

Your iris are beautiful! Some of our early ones have started blooming including one with the ugliest color I have ever seen on an iris. This is supposed to be Gai Luron, on old historic variety. It doesn't look like the pictures I have seen online. It will be dug up and thrown away.

Nancy

We have had a lot of cool weather so far this spring, but in spite of that Middendorffii is really close to blooming. Right behind is Durmortieri. The weather is expected to do a 180 next week with temps in the 80s most days, and a couple days in the 90s. We may have blooms in April after all.

Sherry: I wanted Batik so much that I went to the Iris sale one fall and asked the experts if Iris could be grown in a pot. The Iris reps there said NO! Bearded Iris need space over the long haul. One lone voice disagreed. Since I really really wanted Batik I chose to ignore sound advice from the other 99% and listened to her. Fast forward 1 year and the upshot was.........Iris indeed do NOT take to pot culture. Goodbye Batik..........Maryl

Your roses and clematis look great! Hopefully we will see some scapes from your gardens soon.

Sherry

Lovely roses! And good to see the start of your season. Wonky spring weather probably set my start back again but at least scapes are up!

Thanks, Kate. It has been crazy, hasn't it Kate? The very cool mornings but now hot days.I finally have the front big beds complete and have been working in the rose bed.The roses look the best of anything though the clematis are blooming, but the iris are very slow but pretty. Ah well. Gardens do what they do as the weather allows.

kay

A new clematis this year

Native azalea

I'm enjoy seeing what's blooming in others gardens before the "big event" of daylilies. My favorite of yours is the Snowball Bush. That's huge. Mine only got to about 10-12 feet. I trained mine into a multistemed tree, sort of like a Crape Myrtles. They say they are short lived here but I got about 15-20 years out of mine. How old is yours?.........I also like your Columine. It grows for me in places nothing else wants to.........Maryl

Sherry, your hostas looking great!

Peren, are you going to have more frosts? I think we are in the clear now

Nicholworth , I have arrived bto conclusion that Praying hands need lot more sun to grow well and likely potted too. I like how your hellebores bare spreading. Mine have crossed and now coming in all shapes and colors. Takes 10 years though...

Yeah, being a farmer unpredictable and one can get a lot of heartaches with crop failure. Feeling blessed here, perennials have recovered as expected , remains to be seen how much hosta got hit. Gardener 40 miles south posted his hostas got hit and people in Chicago were fine .

Debra , am wondering if city lots tend to be warmer in general?

Lindalana, that is an interesting question. I can imagine that could be so as brick and stone houses (like in my neighborhood) do hold heat. We are closer together than houses in the outlying areas. I have noticed in the winter, even when we have snow, there tends to be a couple inches close to the house where the snow doesn’t stay. That would explain why Lancifolia on the side of the house did fine even though I couldn’t cover it.

debra

lindalana it is certainly a possibility that I could get another frost. The 14 day forecast is looking good but ...About 10 years ago we went down to 19F on May 23rd. That was shocking! Everything

eventually revived but it was not pretty. I never want to see a repeat of that highly unusual event!

Debra, the sale was a smash!

This was my display at the start of the sale.....

....and this was near the end!

Pieter

Lovely first bloom Maryl! I hope those nineties disappear for a while, too soon!

Sherry

Kay - I actually found two this afternoon - one on a seedling, and the other on Kiss of Paradise, which many years is the first to bloom. The end of April is when I usually start seeing the first scapes.

Debra

I checked my Happy Returns after reading Kay's comment to Debra. Because Happy Returns is in ground it suffers none of the disturbances that my pots have to go through in early spring. Sure enough scapes with buds are arising as I type.......... Little Dream Caster opened another single bloom today. Golly it's a cutie even as a single........Thank you Nancy on the well wishes. Let's see who of my Kentucky friends goes first - you or Brad.........................Maryl